


Extracts from Draco's Journal

by Celandine



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Diary/Journal, Drama, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 14:43:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15075380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celandine/pseuds/Celandine
Summary: Draco kept a journal during the year leading up to the Battle of Hogwarts, and for a short time after.





	Extracts from Draco's Journal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [juniperus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/juniperus/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Unofficial Memorial](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15075203) by [Celandine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celandine/pseuds/Celandine). 



After all these weeks in hiding with Snape, it's strange to see my parents again; even stranger to learn that somehow Dumbledore's death has been—not quite covered up, but blamed on "a person or persons unknown", and that Snape is going to serve as the Headmaster of Hogwarts.

Father took me aside and spoke with me about it tonight. He said that in his view, the most important thing is that our family survive and thrive. Second is that we uphold the beliefs and practices that have always made our family great. But if it comes down to choosing between principle and family, the family must always come first. Then he said that as he wouldn't be around to advise me at all times when I'm back in school, that I should watch Snape and follow his lead, because Father knows no one is better than Snape at choosing the winning side. I agree. Snape's managed to gain quite a lot, one way or another, even with the disability of being a half-blood.

* * *

I'm shaking so badly I can't hold a quill steady, so I'm using a Dicta-Quill this time. The Dark Lord has been here, here in Malfoy Manor. Even Father and Mother were afraid of him, I could tell. Father got that stiff proud look on his face, the one which means he's trying not to give anything away. I was terrified myself, more so when I learned I was to be given the Dark Mark. I know that stupid Potter thought I had it last year; he was always trying to see my left arm. It seemed like a great joke. I always made sure to keep my sleeve down, just to string him along. Well, now I have reason to keep it down. It hurt like nothing I could imagine, going on, but afterward Snape told me (in that distant voice he uses when he doesn't want to show emotion) that the Cruciatus Curse was more painful than receiving the Mark, and that I had better remember that.

I don't see how I could forget.

* * *

School started yesterday. It was strange, having Snape at the centre of the high table instead of Dumbledore. Those two he had with him, the Carrows, will bear some watching. The other professors seemed nervous of them, and while I don't necessarily object to that, I have no intention of risking my own neck.

It was odd also not to have Potter and his two cronies over at the Gryffindor table. I'm quite happy not to have to see the Mudblood's ugly face, nor that Muggle-lover Weasley's, but Potter was a good opponent and it won't feel right without him around to taunt. No one else is as fun.

* * *

Quidditch just isn't the same without Potter out there.

* * *

I've been watching Snape a lot. The other Slytherins are all delighted to have him as Headmaster, and they aren't bothered by having the Carrows around as enforcers. I'm sure that's in part because the Carrows almost never punish Slytherins. It's mostly Gryffindors, plus a few each of Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws, who are the usual targets for Alecto and Amycus. But I've been watching Snape. I can tell he despises the Carrows and isn't happy with the way they're dealing with students. His mouth thins every time he looks at one of them, and I've seen him interfere more than once; subtly, to be sure, but he's reduced the punishment for at least four students to my certain knowledge, and none of them Slytherin, either. I think I'd better be careful in my own behaviour.

I would be looking forward to the holidays, just to get out of here for a little bit, but Mother writes that the Dark Lord has been using the Manor as a headquarters, so going home is hardly going to be relaxing.

* * *

Defence Against the Dark Arts has been interesting. We're still studying the standard curriculum—what the N.E.W.T.s will cover hasn't changed, not yet anyhow—but we're also learning the Unforgivable Curses, practising them against spiders and beetles and so on, the way Moody showed us. That old madman had one thing right; you can't defend yourself against something you don't understand. Snape pointed out at the beginning of term that it was ridiculous that the Ministry defined these particular spells as Unforgivable. There are plenty of others with effects just as bad. It's all a question of how you use them, and perhaps why. No magic in itself is either good or evil, it's all in how it's used.

* * *

The less said about the Christmas holidays the better. They were as bad as I expected. The only good thing was that I managed to get out of the house and go flying nearly every day.

* * *

Snape looks grimmer than ever. A bunch of Gryffindors, a few Ravenclaws, and some Hufflepuffs have disappeared. Well, not exactly disappeared, but they're apparently not sleeping in their dormitories, they don't show up for meals, and they're not attending classes. Yet one hears of them being seen from time to time in the corridors. Longbottom is one of them, and the Weasley slut, and that crazy Ravenclaw whose father runs The Quibbler. I have a strong suspicion that I know where they've gone. That room I discovered last year, the one with the Vanishing Cabinet; that's where I think they are hiding. The room itself isn't always findable, and things changed in there sometimes. So that's where I'm guessing they are hiding.

Things have settled into a kind of delicate equilibrium around here. Between Snape and the Carrows there seems to be a tacit agreement on how many students the Carrows can torment each day, and how vicious they can be. If they go too far, Snape intervenes, but otherwise he gives them free rein as best as I can tell.

* * *

Mother sent a letter to say that I would be coming home for the Easter holidays, possibly longer. I should bring my school books with me so that I could continue studying, in case I don't return to Hogwarts until time for N.E.W.T.s. When I told Crabbe and Goyle, they seemed unsurprised. Crabbe reached for another piece of cake, and Goyle shrugged.

* * *

What the hell am I doing? Following Snape's lead, I suppose, although... I don't know, maybe not his lead directly so much, but a path based on things I heard him say while we were in hiding last summer, and on his actions and expressions of this past year. I lied and said I didn't recognise Potter. I think Aunt Bella guessed I was lying, though.

What will happen now?

* * *

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be Potter. To have no parents, no family expectations to live up to. Maybe Potter isn't such a good example of that, come to think of it, given that he's been the Boy Who Lived since he was a baby too young to remember. There's a lot of expectations that go along with that particular eminence, and they're probably worse than anything I've had to deal with. All right then, I wonder what it would be like to be someone like Snape, another half-blood but someone of whom there were never any family expectations, as far as I can tell. He's done what he could to secure his position, and I can respect that. Gryffindors always complain that he favours Slytherins, and perhaps there's some truth to the accusation, although they do conveniently ignore the way that Dumbledore always favoured them. McGonagall, though, I would say has always been pretty impartial, except for being partisan over the Quidditch matches. Of course she wouldn't be a good Head of House if that weren't the case.

Why am I going on about the professors? Maybe it's because I'm nervous about what's going to happen, and trying to distract myself. I'm not important enough to anybody to be told anything about the larger scheme of things, but I've picked up bits of information here and there. Even my father seems to be having a few second thoughts about his choice to follow Lord Voldemort. Not our master's overall goals, or even necessarily his methods, but the fact that he's obviously insane is giving Father some pause. I shouldn't even think that. Snape's taught me the technique of Occlumency but I'm not all that good at it, and if Lord Voldemort sees how I feel about him in my thoughts, the best I can hope for is a swift Avadra Kedavra. Then it would all be over in an instant. More likely, though, he would Crucio me and use me as leverage against my parents.

* * *

For all that Father and Mother thought Dumbledore was so despicable over his ideas about Mudbloods and forbidden curses and so forth, it's a fact that all of us had more real freedom when he was in the ascendancy.

* * *

Greg Goyle is dead. Lots of other people, too, but he's one I saw die. Well, more or less. He set fire to the Room of Requirement, and Vince and I would be dead too if Potter and his cronies hadn't rescued us. The bad news just keeps coming. My parents are alive, but we, not just my family but all of us who supported Lord Voldemort, will be tried before the Wizengamot. Snape won't be, though. He's dead too, bitten by that huge snake Nagini that Lord Voldemort had. Apparently Neville Longbottom—of all people!—killed the snake after it bit Snape. I hear that Snape left proof of some kind that he was really working for Dumbledore all along, so he would have been safe from Azkaban if he'd lived.

* * *

You'd think that after everything else, it wouldn't matter that I never took my N.E.W.T.s, but Mother insists that I must finish my schooling. She won't let me go back to Hogwarts though. Last time she visited Father in Azkaban they put their heads together and agreed to send me to Durmstrang for one final year. I suppose it won't be that bad. Several of the others will be there too, Theodore and Millicent and Pansy. I would rather have stayed at Hogwarts, even if it would have been difficult. I hear that Potter and some others are working to restore it now. I would have liked to have helped, for Snape's sake. In a way that's what he gave his life for

.

**Author's Note:**

> This story was originally written in 2010, but not posted until now when I rediscovered it in my files.


End file.
